I wanted to test Substack’s audio feature, so I created an audio summary of this! Let me know if you’d appreciate more audio posts from me. It was fun to record and go off a bit about how silly the 90s were.
A new study about a specific fragrance material, musk ambrette, is worth discussing since it’s unclear if consumers will ever encounter it today. It has been used to add a clean, modern aspect to a scented product.
Researchers studied chemical exposure in order to better understand early puberty trends. Below is an excerpt from an NBC News article about the study:
Combing through 10,000 compounds in a library of licensed pharmaceuticals, environmental chemicals and dietary supplements, the researchers found several that might influence the timing of puberty. But children were most likely to be exposed to only one of them: musk ambrette, according to the report, published in Endocrinology.
Musk ambrette, a synthetic form of the fragrance, could latch onto a puberty-related receptor in the hypothalamus, which would lead to the release of GnRH, a hormone involved in the maturation of sexual organs and the production of estrogen, testosterone and progesterone.
The dream of the 90s is alive in fragrance
Synthetic musks revolutionized the fragrance market in the 1990s when consumers wanted "unisex" scents that reflected minimalist, gender-inclusive fashion trends. Think Calvin Klein. Men wore floral scents, women wore oceanic scents, and everyone wanted a bit of sex—musks.
Here’s where functional meets unisex-y: "Functional" is how industrial perfumers describe the "modern" scents consumers now expect (or like to smell) in cleaning products. Functional scents are used in household goods like soaps and detergents—it's even in products like apparel you might buy off the shelf at a Target or retailer.
Given consumer demand for modern scents in household cleaning products, you’ll find detergents that offer sex appeal. Yep.
How you can spot musk ambrette
“This study suggests that, out of an abundance of caution, it is important for parents to only use personal care products for their children that are federally regulated.”
—Natalie Shaw, M.D., M.M.Sc., NIH, and the study’s author. Source: Endocrine Society press release, published September 10, 2024.
The clean, fresh news: IFRA is the international organization that governs what can be used by quality producers of anything with fragrances. The use of musk ambrette is banned from the EU and it's also outside of products made with IFRA guidance.
The smelly, musky news: The FDA doesn't ban musk ambrette, so it's quite legal to include in products sold here. Any time you see "clean," "white," or "modern" described in a scent, it may include one of hundreds of synthetic musks.
I hope this was helpful or, at the very least, informative! I would be very interested if you find proof of musk ambrette in a US-produced cleaning product. And I promise to have a better outro next time for those who listened in.
Margarita Noriega
Perfumer-in-my-residence
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